There are times when reality is stranger than fiction, and this story is the best proof of that. The protagonist is Michael Packard , a 56-year-old lobster fisherman. This Friday he was diving around the Herring Cove beach, about 100 kilometers away from the city of Boston (United States). From one moment to the next, and without giving him time to react, the diver was swallowed by a humpback whale. He spent half a minute inside the animal’s mouth, and then he spat at it alive.
The incredible story of the diver swallowed by a humpback whale
Michael Packard himself tells the story from the hospital. He explains that he felt a very strong push, and suddenly everything around him turned black . The first thing he thought about was a great white shark attack, but he dismissed this idea because he did not notice any kind of tooth pressure on his body. What the diver felt inside the humpback whale’s mouth was how it tightened the muscles in its mouth.
It was then that he began to move to try to get out of there . After half a minute of agony, the whale surfaced, and the next thing he remembers is that he saw the light. He began to shake his head vigorously, and suddenly he was out of the whale. A colleague rescued him and called the emergency services.
Michael Packard was taken by ambulance to the hospital. Although the scare was tremendous, everything has remained an anecdote. He has not suffered a fracture, although he does have numerous bruises all over his body .
NEARLY EATEN BY WHALE: Michael Packard just told us his incredible story. He says he was nearly swallowed by a humpback whale while lobster diving off the coast of Provincetown this morning. #NBC10Boston #NECN pic.twitter.com/9IE126H5rY
— Mike Manzoni NBC10 Boston (@MikeNBCBoston) June 11, 2021
What happened?
Experts say there are no records of events similar to this in the area . They explain that Michael Packard was most likely at the wrong time and place.
The way in which humpback whales feed is by opening their mouths completely, so that they catch everything in their path, such as plankton and small fish. Everything indicates that the diver was in a blind spot of the animal , so that he did not see it. Once she realized that she had swallowed it and it was in her mouth, she was surprised and opened her mouth to throw it back into the sea.
